, far as the eye could see, with never a living thing to break the monotony. But presently, as our car lurched

across half the world to fight, and, if need be, die for those ideals which have made the Empire assuredly the greatest and mightiest this world has ever known. And as I listened to the rhythmic tramp of these countless feet, it seemed like the voice of this vast Empire proclaiming to the world that Wrong and Injustice must cease among the na

a row of low-lying wooden buildings, whence presently issued a tall man in rain-sodden trench cap an

d thus I should see nothing doing in the training line; nevertheless he cheerfully offered to show us over the cam

ers and waterproof hat, as, through mud and mire, through puddles and clogging sand, we followed the Major's long boots, crossing bare plateaux, climbing

s the thing. He halted us before devilish contrivances of barbed wire, each different from the other, but each just as ugly. He made us peep through loopholes, each and every different from the other, yet each and every skilfully hidden

ff, which releases the firing lever and in a few seconds it explodes. It is surprising how men vary; some are born bombers, some soon learn, but some couldn't be bombers if they tried-not that they're cowards, it's just a case of mentality. I've seen men take hold of a bomb, pull out the pin, and then stand with the thing clutched in their fingers, absolutely unable to move! And there they'd

killed?"

out of the man's pocket and throw it away. Bomb

the V.C. or M.C. or

iled and sho

and they can't all have 'em! Now

entering the larger of the two, I stopped in surprise, for I looked down into a huge, circular amphitheat

p. "I have 'em filled with sand and stacked as you see!-good many thousands of 'em her

derful ide

own. Now, how about the poison g

. glanced at me. I

a bright-faced subaltern in dingy uniform and surrounded by many dingy boxes and a heterogeneous collection of things. The subaltern was busy at work on a bomb

red the Major, after we had been

nodded the cheerfu

, if you will," suggested the Major.

tain directions to his sergeant

playin' the game-what! But Fritz kept at it and was happy as a bird, till one day we woke up an' started bein' frightful too, only when we did begin we were frightfuller than ever Fritz thought of bein'-yes, rather! Our gas is mor

ntially into the sub.'s ear, wher

ready!" he announced

b. grew immensely busy testing sundry ugly, grey flannel gas helmets, f

ng shown us how we must breathe out through the mouthpiece which acts as a kind of exhaust, o

l O.K.-only the chemical the flannel's saturated with. Now follow me, please,

, and, beyond this yawning doorway I saw a thick, greenish-yellow mist, a fog exactly the colour of strong absinthe; and then we were in it. K.'s

run, stumbled, and in that moment my hand came in contact with an unseen rope. On I went into gloom, into blackness, until I was presently aware of my companions in front and mightily glad of it. In a while, still following this invisible

hold their breath until they fairly well burst, an' some won't go in at all, so we carry 'em in. That gas you've tried is about twenty times stronger than we get it in the open, but these helmets are a rippin'

n in the gas?

ay-yes,

how l

in once for fi

!" I exclai

was expe

you feel any

oke. Like to try a lachrymatory?" he enqu

glancing at K

ished a particularly vicious-looking bomb and fell to poking at it with a screwdriver. I immediately step

t thing's all rig

ight," nodded the sub., using the screwdriv

owever, the refractory pin, or whatever it was, being fixed to his satisfaction,

a liquid-fire bomb fi

ick, grey smoke and yellow flame, smoke that rolled heavily along the ground towards us, flame that burned ever fierce

wn and get a mouthful of that smoke-makes you jolly sick and uncons

these he covered with wet sand, and lo! they had ceased to be; but th

n, I could picture the awful fate of those within, the choking fumes, the fire-scorched bo

ust weep! Ready? One, two, three!" A second explosion louder than the first, a puff of blue smoke into which I presently ran and then uttered a cry. So sharp, so excruciating was the pain, that instinctively I raised hand to eyes but chec

p and fight well, both at the same time-what? Fritz can be very frightful, but we can be more

heery sub., and left him beaming after

s awake and at work to such mighty purpose that her once small army is now numbered

pirit of noble self-sacrifice-men grimly determined to suffer wounds and hardship and death itself, that for those who come after them